Real Salt Lake Postgame

Julius James hails from a part of the world that is no stranger to strong storms, but Friday’s
weather assault on central Ohio had the native of Trinidad & Tobago on his toes.

“Let me just tell you something: I’m from the Caribbean and we have storms but hurricanes go
straight to Trinidad and then they veer away,” he said following the Crew’s power-delayed 2-0 win
against Real Salt Lake. “In my whole lifetime, I’ve never been in a storm as bad as the one
(Friday). I was sitting in my house and I don’t want to say I was scared, but I was pretty worried
because I had no idea what to expect. Everyone keeps talking about Columbus has storms sometimes
and tornadoes and I was just sitting in my house (wide-eyed).

While sitting at home in Grandview, James said he mustered the courage to peek outside –
barely.

“The wind – I had to see it so I looked outside once and it was dark,” he said. “Then I said, ‘
Is this real?’ so I opened the door and there’s tree leaves flying all over the place. I went and I
moved my car away from trees and the building. Thank God for that because after there were trees
everywhere. It was quite an experience.”

The ensuing power outages across the region pushed game’s start back to 9 p.m. Not many players
go the email message, however, and wound up arriving at the stadium an hour earlier than necessary.
Defender Josh Williams was among them.

“I just sit around on game days and don’t really do anything,” he said. “I actually showed up an
hour early because I didn’t get the email on time. I was like, ‘What am I going to do here for an
extra hour?’ I went out on the field and walked around. When it came down to it everyone in the
locker room stayed focused and kept our mind on each other.”

With temperatures in the low 90s, Williams opted to walk the stadium with teammate Chad
Marshall.

“Me and Chad had a nice discussion,” he said, declining to elaborate. “I normally pace up and
down my apartment so it was nice to be here doing that instead of bugging (my roommate).”

As for whether Warzycha felt the later start affected his club, the coach smiled.

“Well, we won 2-0 so no,” he said.

Gaven’s Game: In the paper, I pegged Emilio Renteria as the man of the match because I
thought the forward had one of his most impactful games of the season. However, it was midfielder
Eddie Gaven who had a bottle of champagne and a game ball nestled inside his locker as he met with
reporters.

“Eddie Gaven worked so hard and he deserved it,” said midfielder Tony Tchani, who got the start
in the middle with Milovan Mirosevic still recovering from injury. “It’s not just because he scored
– he deserved it.”

Gaven downplayed the award.

“It could’ve been any guy on the field tonight,” he said. “It was a great team effort. It was a
hot night and the boys worked hard.”

Goals: Tchani got the Crew on the board with his second goal in as many matches
after a nifty pass from forward Emilio Renteria.

“I just saw Emilio fighting for the ball,” Tchani said. “At first when he fell down I kind of
stopped. When he got up and beat the guy I busted my (butt) to be there.”

Renteria left the locker room and was not available for comment.

Gaven got on the board thanks to a pass from Williams that caromed off the midfielder’s left
foot, off the post and across the line.

“Josh played a great ball,” he said. “I kind of slid at it because it was a little bit in front
of me. I thought it was going over when it came off my foot but luckily it hit the post and went
in. it was a great play by Josh to be able to take a touch, hit it, hit it to me open in the box.”&
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O’Rourke’s Return: After suffering a severely sprained left ankle in the Crew’s
road match May 23 at Seattle, veteran Danny O’Rourke returned to the lineup as a defensive
midfielder and went the full 90 minutes in the victory. After early miscues on the defensive end
helped send the Crew to a 2-1 road defeat against Chicago last week, his presence helped keep his
club confident in the early going and set a tone for the match.

“He has a lot of experience,” Warzycha said. “He probably wasn’t 100 percent fit … but he can
manage the game. Especially late in the game when you have to pass the ball all over the field,
experience is important. You have to win the ball in the middle and he did that.”

“That guy’s a beast,” Williams said. “He’s all over the field. You hate playing against that guy
but you love having him on your team. I’m glad he’s on our team because I know he’d be kicking the
crap out of us if he was on the other team. as long as he’s kicking the other team, I’m fine with
it.”

Subs: Warzycha used all three of his second-half substitutions and wasted little
time doing so, inserting the recovering Milovan Mirosevic in for Aaron Schoenfeld in the 52nd
minute.

“Aaron did a lot of running in the first half and it was his first game since the injury, so he
was gassed,” Warzycha said. “We knew at halftime he was going to go 5-10 minutes and we were going
to make a sub.

“We didn’t want to take a risk with Milo and put him in the beginning of the game to have him
play 90 minutes because of his hamstring. That’s what we did against New England (on June 19) – we
put him on the field, he played 90 minutes and that’s when he got injured. When you get fatigued,
that’s when you hurt muscles.”

Defensive midfielder Kevan George came on in the 70th minute to relieve Tchani, while Justin
Meram subbed for Renteria in the 79th. However, Warzycha said he had not planned to sub Renteria
out of the lineup.

“Probably I would take somebody else off the field but Emilio asked for a sub so I had to
respect that,” the coach said.

Not Selected: After making the trip to Chicago and seeing 12 minutes of action as
a reserve, Warzycha did not name first-round draft pick Ethan Finlay to the 18 for tonight’s
match.